


Hell on Wheels

by Dira Sudis (dsudis)



Category: due South
Genre: Community: ds_flashfiction, M/M, Skating
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-05-13
Updated: 2010-05-13
Packaged: 2017-10-09 10:43:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/86408
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dsudis/pseuds/Dira%20Sudis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>Once you've gotten the mental image of a Mountie on roller skates into your head, you can't stop until you've actually seen it.</em></p>
            </blockquote>





	Hell on Wheels

**Author's Note:**

> This story was written for the Footwear challenge and first posted September 5, 2003.

I planned this for a long time. Out there in the Arctic, trudging along on those goddamn snowshoes, I schemed. I plotted. I even threw in some maniacal laughter, when I could breathe that much. Fraser thought it was funny to say that I sounded ‘unbalanced' when I did that. Unbalanced, see, because I kept falling down every five steps. Yeah, I didn't think it was very funny either.

But I didn't mind too much, because, like I said, I had plans. Fraser had put me in these stupid snowshoe things, and he was going to pay and pay and pay. Oh yeah.

I mean, I had enough time to think it out carefully. I realized there were pretty good odds that he'd be good at it, just like he is at everything, and even if he wasn't there was no way he would feel anything like my total misery at not even being able to _waddle_ on the snow.

I didn't care about that, either, after a while. After a few weeks, I got better at the snowshoes, and it wasn't so much about making him suffer as just. Well. Once you've gotten the mental image of a Mountie on roller skates into your head, you can't stop until you've actually seen it.

So we did the quest thing, and we came back to Chicago, and I found a roller rink that was still open, and I dragged him down there. Gave him a whole line of bullshit that worked about as well as you'd expect, since I'd had close to three months to script it, by then.

I'd gotten so used to Fraser being Mr. Capable up north, and so convinced that he was going to take all the fun out of my revenge by being a natural roller skater, that I sort of forgot how he _moves_, especially when he's nervous. And, hell, at least when I was on my ass waving those snow shoes in the air, it was just the dogs laughing at me. Fraser had three school field trips and a birthday party full of sugar-high four-year-olds watching him.

Still, no mercy. I laced up my skates and headed out onto the floor, showed him how it's done. Fraser might be the only person I can ever do this in front of, because I don't think he understands the shameful significance of having grown up during the Disco era and knowing how to roller skate really, really well. Stella and I burned all the photos sometime in the early nineties, so I'm safe there.

Anyway, Fraser watched me go round a couple of times, and I was starting to feel good, so I went over and got him to come out on the floor. He did, looking just like a toddler, trying to walk on skates - you'd think he'd get the analogy to ice skating, but I guess he was psyched out by the flashing lights and screaming children. I was making another round, skating backwards so I could watch him, so I saw the whole thing. He tried to dodge a line of seven-year-old girls skating arm in arm, his feet went out from under him, and, _bang_, he was flat on his back, waving those ugly orange rental skates in the air.

Now, the thing about Fraser is that he was always really patient with me about the snowshoes. Every time I fell down, he came over and helped me up and said it happened to everyone when they first tried to use snowshoes, except himself of course because he was born on snowshoes, but that was hardly germane.

The thing about me is, when I saw Fraser laying there on the ground, feet in the air and probably the wind knocked out of him and the hell of a backache, I started laughing like a madman. Unbalanced? Oh, yeah. So unbalanced I skated backward right into the goddamn wall.

Now, I still swear I had a concussion, because there is no other way I would have been sitting there, talking to the roller rink pro about how much I loved snowshoes, when Fraser finally got over to me. And there's definitely no way I would have grabbed my partner by the ears, right there in front of the third grade class from St. Anne's, including Sister Mary Rita, and kissed him square on the mouth.

Even with the head injury (which Fraser insists wasn't serious, but what the hell does he know?) I still can't believe I did that in front of a _nun_. But Fraser says I'm already going to hell for the roller skates, so I guess it doesn't make a difference.


End file.
